SEC delays innovation exemption, dragging tokenisation stocks lower on Friday

Shares in several tokenisation-focused firms fell on Friday after the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) postponed its anticipated “innovation exemption” for tokenised securities and cancelled a scheduled commissioner meeting on proposed crypto offering rules. Bullish dropped roughly 8%, Figure fell approximately 9% from Thursday’s session high, Coinbase slid 2%, Circle declined nearly 4%, and Securitize gave back some ground before stabilising after a 27% plunge the previous session. The broader equity indices and bitcoin were broadly flat on the day, making the sector-specific selloff more pointed.

The exemption had been expected to lower the compliance burden for companies seeking to offer trading in tokenised securities and to provide regulatory cover for decentralised finance venues handling such assets. Its continued delay, compounded by the cancelled meeting on a tailored offering regime for certain crypto-linked investment contracts, removed a near-term catalyst that some market participants had been pricing in. Uniswap’s UNI token fell 7% over 24 hours, the weakest performer in the CoinDesk 20 Index, reflecting how far the anticipated relief had already been factored into DeFi-adjacent valuations.

Owen Lau, managing director at Clear Street, characterised the development as a speed bump rather than a structural reversal, noting that Coinbase and Bullish are pursuing tokenised equity offerings while Nasdaq and the New York Stock Exchange are building 24/7 trading infrastructure regardless of the exemption’s status. The more material question, Lau suggested, is how questions around the CLARITY Act and the SEC’s legal authority affect the pace at which those plans can actually proceed, potentially lengthening the adoption curve without altering the destination.